Consumer Reports: ‘Stay Away From HealthCare.gov’

Consumer Reports, which publishes reviews of consumer products and services, advised its readers to avoid the federal health-care exchange “for at least another month if you can.” “Hopefully that will be long enough for its software vendors to clean up the mess they’ve made,” the magazine said, having tested the site themselves over the course of the past three weeks.

Noting that only 271,000 of the 9.47 million people who tried signing up in the first week managed to create an account, Consumer Reports then provided a few tips to those attempting to slog through the application process. From attempting successive logins because “error messages . . . may not always match reality” to checking one’s inbox frequently because missing an e-mail a user will be timed out of the site and forced to start from square one, none of the suggestions guaranteed success.

The magazine has also released a string of scathing reviews. On October 1, the day the Obamacare exchanges went online, the magazine told people to be patient: “Don’t worry if you can’t sign up today or even within the next couple of weeks.” A week into enrollment, they urged again to “wait a couple weeks and hope that the site irons out its many problems” because the HealthCare.gov is “barely operational.”

As the editors continued to review the website over the next few days, they only had one positive statement: “On the plus side,” they noted, “consumers coming to HealthCare.gov are no longer stopped cold by an error message or a screen saying they’ve been put in a waiting line.”

Now three weeks into the exchanges, having offered reviews and advice, Consumer Reports said that “if all [these suggestions] are too much to absorb, follow our previous advice: Stay away from Healthcare.gov,” at
least for the time being.

Obamacare opponents have misrepresented Consumer Reports' position
HealthCare.gov problems do not negate benefits of new health law
Published: October 21, 2013 06:40 PM

Pundits opposed to the new health care law and some media outlets have tried to suggest that our coverage of the troubled HealthCare.gov site means that Consumer Reports has turned against the Affordable Care Act.

Not true. Consistent with our mission to inform and protect consumers, particularly in this complicated health care market, our advice remains the same: The best place to buy coverage on your own is through the Health Insurance Marketplace in your state. That guarantees you will get comprehensive coverage, and it's the only way you can lower the cost of your premiums and possibly even your deductibles and copayments.

Doing that online in most states means registering at and shopping through the federal HealthCare.gov. President Obama acknowledged that site's problems at a Rose Garden event today. "Nobody's madder than me about the fact the website isn't working as well as it should," he said. "Which means it's going to be fixed. And in the meantime you can bypass the website and apply by phone or in person." (To do that, go to Find Local Help, part of HealthCare.gov.) . . .

It's interesting that Obamacare opponents are referring to Consumer reports right and left, and then when I past directly FROM their web site, Consumer Reports statement on the matter, I get so many negative ratings. Fascinating how counter factual Republicans are... and how they can' stand having their arguments measured against truth. Google the headline in my post above, you'll see that is directly on the Consumer Reports web site...

I know people who have signed up with no problem, reduced their deductible massively AND their monthly costs of healthecare AND included their adult children in the plan with no hassle. Clearly different people are having different experiences. It also depends what STATE you are from. Additionally, one can sign-up by calling or by filling out the forms by hand, just like we used to do. I'm not sure Consumer Reports is doing the program or its readers a favor here. I think it's perhaps a bit more complicated than the resources they've dedicated to understanding the problem.

The other problems is that all of these states that have stayed out of it have massively complicated the issue for the federal web site, which has to do the work of all of those separate states in one web site. Sabotage has it's benefits, apparently.

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